Here’s my new screencast showing two ways I ensure that any unit I design or adapt is aligned to our required standards. In a nutshell:

Plan around a particular standard and design with that standard(s) in mind from the get-go.

Design the unit that engages you, the teacher, and your students. Then, look at the standards, check off those the unit hits, and then go back and fill in the gaps.

Remember, if you’re a history, science, or math teacher, you should be doing this exercise with not only your content standards, but with the literacy, listening, speaking, and writing standards as well! You’ll be shocked at how many cross-curricular standards you are hitting!

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2017/10/24/pbl-secret-sauce-3-aligning-the-standards-to-your-pbl-unit/feed/0PBL Secret Sauce #2: Student-Generated Questionshttp://tweenteacher.com/2017/09/21/pbl-secret-sauce-student-generated-questions/
http://tweenteacher.com/2017/09/21/pbl-secret-sauce-student-generated-questions/#respondFri, 22 Sep 2017 02:08:46 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=6979For Part II in my PBL video series, I thought I’d share how I integrate student-generated questions throughout the sequence of the unit. In other words, the students generate the prompts that help propel them along the PBL journey.

This post picks up with my last one left off. In PBL Secret Sauce: Entry Level Event, I covered how to launch the overall unit. This video represents the very next step, that of having students develop questions generated by their curiosity from that launching element. And while these videos are meant to chronologically follow the day-to-day implementation of a PBL unit, I also share some advice on how to integrate student-generated questions periodically throughout the unit to bring in student choice and voice over and over again.

It’s important that we begin to release the authority in the classroom and hand it over to the students. HOWEVER, when you inspire them to ask great questions, you won’t be disappointed about where those questions will lead you. A colleague of mine who is new to PBL is currently running a unit set around the National Parks. Her entry level event was a Skype with a ranger, and the questions the students generated after that interview blew her away:

“I am so amazed what the kids can do. They were so eager to learn more about condors and bighorn sheep after talking with Michael…And I did no teaching/lecturing myself!”

She went on to tell me that the questions the students generated represented the very pathways she herself had planned for her students! What’s even better, however, is that the students created the journey through the unit themselves. Their questions pointed the class in the direction the teacher initially planned to take them. During a PBL unit, you relinquish authority, but you still pull the strings. See?

In the video below, I share five different times during my unit in which I have the students generate questions to guide the next part of the journey.

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2017/09/21/pbl-secret-sauce-student-generated-questions/feed/0A Book Review From My Students: Mia Lee is Wheeling Through Middle Schoolhttp://tweenteacher.com/2017/09/20/a-book-review-from-my-students-mia-lee-is-wheeling-through-middle-school/
http://tweenteacher.com/2017/09/20/a-book-review-from-my-students-mia-lee-is-wheeling-through-middle-school/#respondWed, 20 Sep 2017 23:57:39 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=6974PBL is about meaningful learning, and sometimes that means keeping my antennae up to identify possible ways to bring that authenticity to my students. Sometimes, however, an opportunity falls into my lap. Such is the case with this book review of Melissa and Eva Shang’s Mia Lee is Wheeling Through Middle School.

A couple of weeks ago, I was approached by Melissa Shang, a student-author with great grit and chutzpah, to write a possible review of her book. She co-authored Mia Lee Is Wheeling Through Middle Schoolwith her sister, and it chronicles her difficult transition from elementary to middle school as a disabled student. Melissa’s book was featured in the New York Times, and in the piece we learn that the young writer is also an advocate for the rights of disabled students. Most notably, she’s been petitioning The American Girl organization to produce its first wheelchair-bound doll.

I was honored to read the book, but wondered if perhaps her real audience, middle school students, should really be the ones to chime in here. It was then that Melissa and I agreed on a plan: my students would read and review her book, and I would curate their opinions so that both she and other tween students might see the impact her book has on its intended audience.

Let’s begin with a summary written by my student, Madison:

“Mia Lee is a sixth-grade student who enters middle school full of hope and curiosity despite her disability. Not knowing what middle school has in stored for her, she charges at it head on by getting involved with the Video Production Club. Her interest in the club leads her to run for Video Production Club President but gets faced with tough competition when Angela, a callous character, joins her in the campaign…Regardless of Mia Lee’s mom thinking that Mia is incapable of running for club President, Angela’s constant insults, and Mia’s lack of ideas for her video project, she still perseveres in trying to win the election with the help of her best friends. Even when Mia’s campaign posters mysteriously go missing, Mia is encouraged by her friends to continue running in the election and never lose hope.”

Overall, my students really responded to this book. Mia Lee is clearly a book students can relate to. Each of my student reviewers found something in the book that they recognized from their own lives as middle schoolers. The consensus from the group was that my students would definitely recommend Mia Lee is Wheeling Through Middle School to other tweens. Check out the comments below for the impact that the Shang sisters had on them all:

Jaylynn: Mia Lee is Wheeling Through Middle School by Melissa and Eva Shang is a suspenseful, dramatic, detailed narrative about real life challenges and conflicts that most middle schoolers face, whether they are disabled or not. The more I read, the clearer the theme of the book became: change is never easy, but one must never give up, and continue to overcome challenges that arise from the change….I really enjoyed the mystery and suspense, as well as all the twists throughout the whole book…I would most definitely recommend this book to others because of the plot’s relevance to real life situations that middle schoolers face fitting in with their fellow students, and being understood by parents, and receiving the proper support at school.

Emma: Mia Lee is Wheeling Through Middle School, a novel by sisters Melissa and Eva Shang, is a wonderfully innocent story about how friends are vital to surviving middle school…I really enjoyed reading about Mia’s brain files, and experiencing the conversations between Mia and her friends. The diverse cast of characters was also relieving to see, because not many books include that these days…It taught me about how not everyone is always what they seem, no matter how well they treat you. Like Mia asked her sister, “How can you tell if someone is a fake?” In middle school, you never know.

Halina: Overall I think that the book has an important message that pulled through the entire story. Being disabled is not a burden and just because somebody can’t do all the things an average person can doesn’t make them less of a person. I think the lack of knowledge about the real life of a disabled person shapes people’s perception of people with disabilities. I believe that it’s important that people understand the realistic life of a disabled person and not be so narrow-minded and thinking that their life is so drastically different from ours. The simple truth is that we’re all human, disabled or not…We all go through the same thing.…kids with disabilities don’t need your pity… If I were to put myself in their shoes I’d probably say, “Just becuz I can’t walk or write well or whatever, I can still do just as many great things as you can. I can run for president, I can get into clubs, I can stand up to bullies. I can do anything I set my mind to.”…I really like how you can relate to the book… At some point in the book you’d go “I know how that feels” or “That’s happened to me be too!

Ivan: Before I read this book I generally thought City of Bones and Divergent were my kind of books. I thought that that genre would be the only one in the world that interested me… I was terribly wrong. I had always thought that stories about kids in high school, and middle school were silly and boring. But after I read Mia Lee is Wheeling Through Middle school I had a change of heart….Overall I sincerely like the way the story was written, and now probably the biggest fan of Brain files! They were a great way to advance the story and definitely one of the most excellent part of the developing of Mia’s character, as they reveal her inner thoughts. If a sequel is planned they should include lot of more entries in her brain files and add a new category to keep it interesting.

Trisha: The theme of this book was that just because someone is disabled, it does not mean they cannot do the same things as average people, and I really liked that. I feel that it opened the eyes of people who thought disabled people couldn’t do anything. To add on, I like how there was a plot twist in the end. Another thing enjoyed about the story was that it also showed an experience through friendship; the drama between the main character and her best friend.

Elizabeth: I remember starting 6th with curious eyes, and I must admit, it was tough transitioning to a brand new school, brand new kids, new environment, it was, scary. I cannot even start to imagine how hard it must have been for kids like Mia Lee, dealing with the stares and glares she received rom the students at her school as she rolled through the halls…I really enjoyed how the sister duo included everything that a child entering middle school was expecting – mean girls, kids with judging etc…, friendly students, and the power of friendship. It made me think about the times I was going through as a new sixth grader, wondering if I would make new friends and lose my old ones, if anyone judged me based on my appearance, or if I would even make it through the first month of school. Luckily I met amazing friends, just as Mia had.

It wouldn’t be an honest review without some criticism, and there was some from the students, in that they felt some of the depictions of the ensemble characters were more 2-Dimensional than the main character:

Halina: For a book that was about breaking a stereotype, I felt like some aspects of the book were fairly stereotypical….Although the main character was written and developed well, I thought the other characters were flat and stereotypical…it would’ve nice to see some character development with Angela and I wished we could’ve gotten to know her better like why she’s so mean instead of this one sided-straight up mean character.

Jaylynn: What I did not appreciate about the book was that teachers and administration seemed to be oblivious about all the conflicts in the school, and when the students reached out to them, there weren’t any serious consequences for the bullying that took place.

Nevertheless, there was also an appreciation that the simplicity of some of the characters led to a deeper understanding of the themes:

Elizabeth: Her choice to write almost a children’s book with an in depth message, was impressive – as an eleven-year old author at the time, her style of writing was advanced, different than how a normal kid like myself would have written a story.

Mia Lee is Wheeling Through Middle School is a book about the challenges of being your own person during a time when uniqueness is a hard trait to hold onto. Nevertheless, Melissa and Eva Shang have clearly depicted a relatable character that can teach all middle school students that we all have something to contribute to our school and our lives.

Many thanks to Melissa Shang for reaching out and allowing my students to share in this journey with you as an author and advocate. We are cheering you on!

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2017/09/20/a-book-review-from-my-students-mia-lee-is-wheeling-through-middle-school/feed/0PBL Secret Sauce #1: The Entry Level Eventhttp://tweenteacher.com/2017/09/19/pbl-secret-sauce-the-entry-level-event/
http://tweenteacher.com/2017/09/19/pbl-secret-sauce-the-entry-level-event/#respondWed, 20 Sep 2017 03:17:06 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=6971I know that when teachers learn about Project Based Learning, many times they walk away with the rationale, the research, and the overview of what a unit might look like. But sometimes teachers still have questions about the day-to-day implementation. Totally understandable: PBL, after all, is complex. It’s not something you really “get” until you jump, feet first, into the PBL pool. Nevertheless, I want to make unit development more transparent so that the strategies ripple out to more schools and students.

So I thought I’d create a short series of videos that shared different stages of my most popular PBL unit, The Superhero Unit. Many times, PBL units leverage role-playing to lure students into more rigorous learning. In this unit, students go from developing their own science-based origin stories to forming leagues that will eventually pitch solutions to global issues in front of a mock-United Nations.

I’m thinking that if more teachers can see what I’m doing and when, then they might be more likely to go off and feel more confident in creating their own units.

This first video shares a little about the Entry Level Event, that launching pad for the unit. Some might launch with a website, a discussion, a short movie, or perhaps a guest (bringing an expert into the classroom is one of the many elements typical in a PBL unit). Some launch with a primary resource. In the past, I’ve launched my unit using a short iMovie that shared some questions to think about as we moved ahead into developing our own superheroes.

This year, however, I did a little pre-launch, one that pulled in meaningful learning in a different way. Much about PBL is about real-world scenarios and meaningful learning. That means paying attention to the world around you for inspiration, resources, and skills students should learn. In this case, two days before my planned launch, Hurricane Harvey hit Texas. With it, came destruction, true. But with it also came the heroes. The everyday heroes came out in droves, those people I’m trying to convince my students that they can also one day become.

The video below describes a bit about how Hurricane Harvey helped to elevate my planned Entry Level Event, and how both my iMovie and the heroes of the hurricane came to launch my PBL unit.

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2017/09/19/pbl-secret-sauce-the-entry-level-event/feed/0Prepping for Open House Right From the Start: The Classroom as a Portfoliohttp://tweenteacher.com/2017/09/09/prepping-for-open-house-right-from-the-start-the-classroom-as-a-portfolio/
http://tweenteacher.com/2017/09/09/prepping-for-open-house-right-from-the-start-the-classroom-as-a-portfolio/#commentsSat, 09 Sep 2017 17:29:15 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=6962So it’s the beginning of the year. You’ve probably spent a few out-of-contract days setting up your classroom to look ready for the masses. You’ve hung brightly colored bulletin boards and surrounded them with stapled up content-related borders. The same borders you recycled from last year because, let’s face it, borders are flippin’ expensive! The school poster of rules that goes something like: “No Gum, No Foul Language, and No Tardies” hangs somewhere hidden in the corner above the whiteboard. After all, how inviting is the reprimanding “Don’t do this” poster anyway? Maybe there’s your own college banner above your desk or a cat-themed “Hangin’ in There” poster smack dab in the middle of a cabinet.

Regardless of what you have in your classroom to greet kids, you’re probably already thinking of ways to do the next wave of decoration to greet parents for Back to School Night in two weeks.

Now, I know this sounds crazy. But don’t.

In general, teachers have developed this pattern of posting student work for only a few weeks at a time then eventually resetting the entire room in one minimum day afternoon in time for Open House in the spring. I say ditch that model.

What would happen if you treated your classroom like a growing portfolio of student work that happened over the course of the school year? Instead, start with a blank portfolio and build it up over time.

Not only would that avoid your own mad scramble to set up for the spring event, but it would allow the students to take ownership of the classroom and begin to build it’s environment from scratch,

WHAT A CLASSROOM PORTFOLIO MIGHT LOOK LIKE

I say treat the room as you would a student portfolio. So in the first few days of the school year, the students and I create the structure of our individual digital portfolios in which to host academic artifacts of their work. Their portfolios are Google Sites with pages such as:

For Open House, Chromebooks are stationed at each table group with tabs open for each student’s portfolio so that families can click around and see what they’ve accomplished throughout the school year.

Before technology, we would do the same kind of thing using manila folders. Each student would label their own folder, put them in a labeled hanging file, and each of those would be put into crates designated by period numbers. These would be whipped out and set out at desks on Open House so that families could flip through the documents within.

But there’s a great power in also treating the classroom itself like a portfolio, a community portfolio, that’s

Our superheroes remain up for the entire year. They represent who we are as learners and as community heroes. The students hate when they start to come down in June

built up over the course of the school year with examples of each vital assignment.
In other words, start with a relatively blank room and build it up over time so that when Open House comes around, the room reflects the year’s accomplishments, not just the three weeks leading up to that night.

Yeah, you run out of room quickly. You’ll have to make some choices. After all, some assignments deserve the real estate of yearlong recognition, while others don’t. And you won’t be able to showcase work from every student (not that you feel that pressure to showcase every student’s work in middle school and secondary levels). But remember, this model isn’t instead of individual portfolios; this is the classroom portfolio. This model isn’t meant to show off what individual students are accomplishing. It’s meant to show off what the class has accomplished as a community.

Start empty. Build the environment together. Celebrate the growth of the academic community. Save yourself the springtime panic by prepping for Open House now.

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2017/09/09/prepping-for-open-house-right-from-the-start-the-classroom-as-a-portfolio/feed/10ADVICE FOR A TWEEN PARENT (ME) FROM A TWEEN TEACHER (ALSO ME)http://tweenteacher.com/2017/08/16/advice-for-a-tween-parent-me-from-a-tween-teacher-also-me/
http://tweenteacher.com/2017/08/16/advice-for-a-tween-parent-me-from-a-tween-teacher-also-me/#respondWed, 16 Aug 2017 17:57:30 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=6957My kid is now deep into his 11th year on this planet, and as such, will begin middle school tomorrow. Now, with my area of expertise, you’d expect me to find some relief in this fact; after all, up until now, I was really winging this parenting thing (although those toddler years do strike a familiar cord). In reality, however, that first eye roll still came as a surprise.

It was then that I woke up and realized that I had a tween living under my roof. What’s also true, is that my kid woke up and realized he had a tween teacher living under his.

Ben is my oldest son of two and he’s a great kid, a great son, and a great older brother. Curious, trustworthy, kind, sharp. But his inherent traits won’t stop the inevitable chaos that signals the onset of tweendom.

WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH MY SON?

For years, I could count on Ben putting away his devices after his electronics time had run out. Nowadays, there’s this wonderfully comic scrambling to hide his iPad under his pillow as he hears me enter the room.

He’s not reading our signals as much. Hell, even if we leave no room for interpretation – “Cut that out,” – he’s smiling while doing “that” again. He pushes the envelope over and over.

His sleep pattern is also totally different. These days, after I’ve closed up the fort at night, I come into his room around 11:00pm to kiss his forehead, only to find him still wide awake. There he lays, eyes wide open, staring at the ceiling and awake. It used to be easy to wake him for school at 7:00am. Now, he meanders out on the weekends around 9:00am complaining that his younger brother’s noise woke him up.

He stinks. I mean really stinks. Not metaphorically. I’m talking we could buy stock in Tom’s Deodorant and keep them in business.

WHAT’S INEVITABLE

I always tell parents of middle schoolers that they have to realize that they won’t be able to avoid the tween years altogether. Girls will go through a chapter of cattiness. They try out the feeling of being mean on their tongues. Boys get a little lunk-headed and goofy. They flirt with laziness. It’s possible the tweens will be a short chapter; but it could be a long one too. Ya’ never know. All you can do as a parent is plant the seeds of decency and hope that they balance out before too long.

Elementary students are to caterpillars as high schoolers are to butterflies.

Therefore, high schoolers are to butterflies as middle school students are to .

Answer? Howler monkeys. That’s right. Somewhere between caterpillars and butterflies, the human child becomes an entirely different species. OK, maybe they are not totally unrecognizable, but the fact is that tweens straddle two worlds, and that defines a lot of who they are during this time of their life and how they function as learners.

In any tween classroom, let’s say from around 5th grade to 9th grade, you have students who watch CNN and those who still watch the Disney Channel. There are kids “playing doctor,” and those still playing patty-cake. There are kids who have their eyes set on the high school college entrance requirements, and those who still need to be watched to make sure they put their homework in their backpack.

I don’t know yet which will be my own kid (though I expect I’ll be making sure that homework is in his backpack for a while until he can prove otherwise), but the fact is that there are definite, biological differences between a tween and his elementary counterpart.

At some point, a switch was flipped and Ben became far more sensitive. He feels so deeply now, and he was a deep-feeling kid even before. But now it’s sometimes uncontrollable, and many times his sensitivity seems to appear for no reason that he can communicate or even understand. We’ve been hearing a lot of “sorry”s these days through ugly cries he can’t seem to control.

From my studies on the tween brain, I also know that they are wired to be indecisive. Their frontal lobes are still smooth. Nevertheless, it’s at this time that we tend to push them to think deeper and require decisions that have higher-stakes.

So to help myself as I look down this tunnel of tweendom, I thought that I, the teacher, would give myself, the parent, some advice. I can take it or leave it, of course, but it’s important to be straightforward with parents to help them out with this upcoming chapter.

TIPS TO HELP TWEEN PARENTS FROM A TWEEN TEACHER

Keep devices charging in a public place – Don’t want him up all night playing on his computer or phone? Don’t have it in his room. Yep, he’ll yell and complain. Yep, he’ll beg to be trusted. Don’t. Keep the devices public, especially at night.

Encourage oxygenation – Physical activity is vital under any circumstances, but in particular for our kids’ more transitional chapters. While our kids might want to crash and click on the couch, activity helps to keep those brains firing.

Pick your battles – Not every eye roll deserves a reaction. In fact, if you want fewer, you’ll pick which moments to react to.

Don’t get sucked into the drama. – Take everything with a grain of salt. Remember, everything FEELS extreme for a tween. That doesn’t mean teachers are THAT unreasonable or that their friend meant to be THAT hurtful. Remember that your tween’s filter is clogged with the changes that they are going through.

Know his friends, but don’t expect to control his friendships. – It’s perfectly acceptable to know names and numbers of friends and families. But know that you won’t be able to know them all. Be aware, but also trust.

Remember to enjoy him – The tweens years can also be a fun stage. Tweens are funny. They think differently and it’s awesome to hear the perspectives they bring to the table. They can talk about history, politics, relationships, but they also go nuts over something as simple as smelly pencils.

Realize that kids are a Works in Progress – Allow them time to continue writing the rough draft that is their life. Forgive kids when they mess up. And when they screw up royally, let them try again.

Be there to listen, but don’t expect them to talk – With tweens, their volume goes up even while the communication might go down. Let tweens process at their own pace. That might mean allowing them to go to bed mad. Having said that, if it’s a big enough deal, don’t let them move on without closure, reflection, and if necessary, an apology. There’s only so much you should let slide, including how they talk to family members or treat past friends. Remember to teach them that tone in the voice is as important as intention and content.

Remember who you were as a tween – You were a jerk too. OK, well, maybe you were perfect, but I sure as heck wasn’t. I did exactly as I was wired to do: roll my eyes and screw up.

Maintain expectations but be empathetic – Don’t lower your expectations of how to function as a family or how we treat one another, but be empathetic for what he’s going through. Stand strong in the face of his inevitable anger and disappointment. Yep, it’s true. A mom’s reputation is bound to be marred during this chapter, but you can’t be scared to do the strong things even when he might hate you for it.

I’m crazy about my kid, but I don’t think for a second that he’s going to avoid this chapter. I’m hoping if I can see him clearly, maybe I can help him get through this bumpy time and come out the other side stronger and ready to continue down the road towards an even bigger challenge in life: adulthood.

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2017/08/16/advice-for-a-tween-parent-me-from-a-tween-teacher-also-me/feed/0End-Of-Year Reflection: The Epic Poem Haikuhttp://tweenteacher.com/2017/05/17/end-of-year-reflection-the-epic-poem-haiku/
http://tweenteacher.com/2017/05/17/end-of-year-reflection-the-epic-poem-haiku/#commentsWed, 17 May 2017 21:56:08 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=6937As we’re ending the school year, I know that the tween brains in my classroom are all silently deciding what information will be transferred to long-term memory and what will forever be taken out with the trash. To hopefully avoid your content being left to the dump, it’s really important that you help them reflect on what they learned and how they learned it. This one step can help ensure that more of your lessons and units are deeply embedded than deleted.

So as we’re wrapping up the school year, I wanted to share a lesson that I do that helps my tweens reflect back on all that we have done together. It’s called the Epic Poem Haiku.

Part I of the assignment not only serves to embed the information more deeply, it also gives students a visual mirror of what they’ve accomplished.

Part II of the assignment also gives me a sense of what had an impact on their learning so that I can improve my class from year-to-year. In other words, their reflection helps my own.

This assignment is a two-parter. The first part can be accomplished in groups. The second is an individual activity. See below for details:

Part I:

Directions: You can work with a partner or up to 3 other people for this assignment. Look
at all the resources at your disposal to reflect back on your year in ELA. This can be week-to-week, quarter-by-quarter, topic-by-topic. You need to create an epic haiku poem. Each stanza must reflect 1 thing that was learned. Hint: Look at Wolpertworld. Check out Google Classroom. Look at your digitial portfolio or even the walls of the classroom. Find the places that can help you remember long ago, and break the stanzas up into really detailed bites. Who knows how many you’ll come up with! Think in a really detailed way, and remember that a haiku is broken up into 3 lines: 5-7-5

Here’s an example:

Brain sweats inventing.

Experts here for convention.

Dog poop on shoe solved.

Connect all of the stanzas together and submit. The due date of this assignment is Thursday, May 11.

Once the students brought in the scrolls, we created a gallery walk around the room of the unraveled poems. Some of them could unscroll across the length of the room. Students from different periods could write on the actual epic poem itself or slap-on post-its to comment on what they were reading.

Some read:

“I forgot all about this! I loved this assignment!” or “Oh, you really focused on collaborating here. I wrote a stanza on the same thing, but focused on the story.”

Part II:

Thinking back on your collaborative epic haiku poem, create a visual graph of the school year assessing what engaged you the most. Select the key assignments (10-20) that you believe contributed to your learning this school year. Create a bar graph that visually displays the lessons/units that you found most engaging and/or effective. Create a symbol of your own learning to represent the year and use that on the bar graph itself.

On the X-axis of your bar graph must be the lesson titles. On the Y-axis of your graph, you need to produce a list of words to describe the engagement level of the lesson. Words to describe your engagement level might be anything from “dull” to “exhilarating!” Your choice! If you are using icons or symbols that are not of your own design, you must also submit a Works Cited on a separate document.

This assignment is due Monday, May 22.

Look, there is a time and place for Project Based Learning, but there’s also the time for a simple project. I believe that a perfect way to spend one of those classroom days at the end of the year is on a project that’s focused on reflection and metacognition. As we approach the end of the year, complete with its grade level field trips, carnivals, awards lunches, and promotion practices, it’s important to make every stand-alone day count.

Have kids look back at the year using an academic lens. Have kids acknowledge and create something based on what they’ve accomplished. You’ll find they remember your classroom community even long after their mortarboard hat has been tossed into the air.

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2017/05/17/end-of-year-reflection-the-epic-poem-haiku/feed/1521Abstract Concept to Concrete Awareness: 3DPrinting to Teach Growth Mindsethttp://tweenteacher.com/2017/02/16/abstract-concept-to-concrete-awareness-3dprinting-to-teach-growth-mindset/
http://tweenteacher.com/2017/02/16/abstract-concept-to-concrete-awareness-3dprinting-to-teach-growth-mindset/#commentsThu, 16 Feb 2017 18:24:49 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=6902One of the things I like about 3d Printing in middle school is that it makes the abstract more concrete. Middle schoolers need that because of where their brain is at developmentally. They straddle the threshold from concrete thinking to more abstract concepts, and hands-on learning really helps to push this development along.

Growth mindset also has a way of being very abstract as a concept. It’s almost too amorphous to believe for many students. An informal survey of my honors classes revealed that while they could define a growth mindset, only half of them felt they had one. Of those who didn’t, many said they believed in the concept but were pretty sure they “didn’t have it.” The others were skeptical about its existence at all. I wonder how much of that has to do with the pressure we (parents and teachers) put on our kids to learn it all and learn it quickly.

Nevertheless, embracing growth mindset is vital when we’re talking about teaching our tweens, all of whom are, after all, Works In Progress. 3D printing goes great with growth mindset because it helps our middle schoolers learn that they also often need multiple drafts before they get it right.

In one project, a student has to challenge their concepts of failure and embrace what they learn from each 3D-printing attempt.

Check out the image below of a student’s attempt to 3D-print badges that he designed for his table group’s superhero league. We were talking about symbolism at the time and designing badges that represent the causes our leagues would fight for. As you can see, this student’s comments reflect a growth from blame to ownership and finally success:

Here’s another series of prints. This one is of an invention that required some design tweaks before it could successfully print:

Making, and more specifically, 3D-Printing, can be made into a metaphor for other subjects and skills. In the poster below, I asked students to post the challenges they are having with anything they are making, whether it is a 3D print, a CAD design, or a more traditional essay.

Writing IS Making.

Along those same lines, Thinking, therefore, is also a form of Creation.

Use the tools at your disposal so that they can be metaphors for more complex concepts. Help those middle schoolers bridge the worlds on which they stand, both the concrete world of childhood and the more abstract world of young adults.

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2017/02/16/abstract-concept-to-concrete-awareness-3dprinting-to-teach-growth-mindset/feed/4The Ultimate Screencasting Guide for Teachers and Studentshttp://tweenteacher.com/2016/11/11/the-ultimate-screencasting-guide-for-teachers-and-students/
http://tweenteacher.com/2016/11/11/the-ultimate-screencasting-guide-for-teachers-and-students/#commentsFri, 11 Nov 2016 13:25:04 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=6572Lately, I’ve been getting really deep into Screencasting, in particular for my English Language Learners and special ed students. I know it’s been around, and we’ve all heard about it, but finding resources out there that make it concrete can be hard.

So what is Screencasting?

Screencasting is a digital recording, also known as video screen capture, that also includes audio. According to Kathy Schrock, “Screencasting is the capture all of the action on a computer screen while you are narrating.”

Why Use Screencasting?

There are many reasons to use screencasts in your teaching and assessing. Screencasts…

Add a personal touch to your online lessons

Add a more visual approach to text-based assignments

Help to highlight text and illustrate topics

Provide 24/7 models

Encourage more independent learning

Differentiated Assessment of Content Knowledge

Help to Provide Quicker and Richer Feedback

Humanize the Teacher

Help a teacher to learn students quicker

Share skills/tools with other teachers

Provide Engaging Opportunities for Informal Assessment

In particular, screencasting helps to address some of the needs of our EL and SPED populations because it…

Provides more visual lesson delivery

Helps to model fluency

Incorporates Multi-modal elements into lessons

Focuses on engagement

Supports the standards of Listening and Speaking

Allows for some student control over the pacing of their learning

How Do You Use Screencasting in the Classroom?

Vehicles for Assignments/Flipped Model – Here’s a annotated screenshot of one of my flipped assignments:

How to Guides – Here’s one I whipped together to help my staff learn about Google Voice Typing.

Feedback for Student Work– I find that it’s far easier to give feedback verbally than with any color pen. Therefore, my feedback is richer and more individualized for each student.

Maintaining an Archive of Skills – I keep my videos embedded on my class agenda next to related bullet points on the syllabus. That way, students can review concepts about things such as “How To Use Easy Bib in Google Docs” or “How to Sign Into Tinkercad.”

Student> Student Feedback: I have students read a peer’s essay that was written on a Google Doc, then record a screencast walking through it step-by-step, sharing their thoughts – both positive and critical – as they go. They then create a link to their recording and insert it into a comment box off the same Google Doc.

Brainstorming – For our EL learners, sometimes speaking their thoughts prior to writing them down is an easier first step. Have students talk about your content area and then have them transcribe and revise their thoughts into a more formal written assignment.

9 Norms of Screencasting

Although I’ve never found a definitive list, I thought I’d compile just some of the things I tell students and also remind myself prior to recording a screencast:

Plan – Outline, Mindmap – It’s important to develop an outline or mindmap that might help you get down your basic thoughts together prior to recording. Although I’m not a huge fan of having kids read directly from a page, they also don’t want to wing it entirely. Sometimes chunking your ideas onto the pages of a slideshow helps. Some might want to use a visual tool like Storyboard That! to help develop a digital storyboard to help plan.

Rehearse – Again, while I tend to like the informal tone in many screencasts, I also don’t believe in something that’s totally off the cuff.

Look Out Behind You! – I’ve seen naked siblings run across the background of a room. I’ve seen parents walk in yelling to get in the shower. Know what’s going on in the house and prepare your area. Make your bed.

Watch What You are Wearing – If you are recording something at home (or if we’re video conferencing with me during online office hours, for that matter), students have to be wearing appropriate clothes. Actually, my two rules are, “No pajamas and I never want you to show the camera your cat’s butt.” Students do weird things when they’re excited with something new.

Set a Time Limit – In terms of how long, this depends on your purpose. Is it an exit card? :15-:30- seconds. Is it a book report? 3-5 minutes. Less is more. I’m looking for efficient responses as well as fluent ones.

Warn Others That You are Recording – Inform others that there will be a camera on in the house for an assignment. Let them know the space that that camera can see or that you will need quiet for X-amount of time. I have a spinning “on air” light that I put just inside the door of the classroom that adjoins mine. It tells my colleague not to come in and grab her salad out of the fridge for a couple of minutes.

Look at the camera – Make sure if you are reading cue cards that they are positioned such that your eyes are looking towards the camera. It’s more personable for your viewer. It’s just another reason to get in the habit of using bullet points, rather than a full script. You don’t want your eyes to get trapped to the page.

Edit ums and ers – If you’re using a program like iMovie or WeVideo, you can easily edit out glitches and vocal slow-downs. It’s not always necessary, but there are programs out there to perfect your screencast if you want.

Watch it in its entirety before posting – I tell my students that I cannot be the first one to watch their screencast. I’ve had kids turn in videos of only the view of their eyebrows moving. “Proofread” your work.

What are Different Screencasting Programs?

There are many screencast programs out there, and I’ve tried a lot of ‘em. Here are those I recommend for different reasons:

Screencastify – this is free through the Chrome web store and it’s the one I use primarily with the students at school

Screencasting is an engaging strategy focused on communication that embraces both the student voice and technology. We all know that if a student isn’t engaged, then that student will not be learning as deeply as they can be. Screencasting has allowed me to encourage more independent learning and personalized assessment.

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2016/11/11/the-ultimate-screencasting-guide-for-teachers-and-students/feed/14The Internet Research Game & 3D Printing: No Whammies!http://tweenteacher.com/2016/10/25/the-internet-research-game-3d-printing-no-whammies/
http://tweenteacher.com/2016/10/25/the-internet-research-game-3d-printing-no-whammies/#commentsWed, 26 Oct 2016 05:30:26 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=6550So in an attempt to broaden the use of the 3D printers in my room, beyond that of my Maker-themed ELA class, I thought I’d leverage the curiosity for the devices as an incentive for my additional classes. That way, my other ELA classes get to begin learning how to design while my Maker-ELA class gets to learn how to check for design quality and to manage the workflow of multiple outside “orders.” Let’s face it, all the kids seem to want to use the printers or design for them, so why not tap into that enthusiasm?

During the first quarter, my students had all created superheroes and written science-fiction origin stories. From there, they created leagues that will, in December, go on to pitch a solution for a global problem to a mock “United Nations” made up of other students. (This unit is featured in my PBL for ELA and History book found here.)

Anyway, this year, I figured they could design superhero league badges using Tinkercad and the 3D printers. But first, they had to earn it.

That’s where the Internet Research Game came in.

First, I announced what the stakes were. The excitement at the prospect of designing and printing badges is awesome. See below.

(Note: Yes, I let them eat in class. Yes, I let them sit wherever they want, and they can move during class.)

Then, I introduced them to search engines other than your standard, run-of-the-mill Google search. I showed them the following:

We analyzed the differences between the engines and noted how one might use Instagrok for one kind of search and Google Junior for another.

Then, for the course of a week, I asked them to sit in their leagues and I asked them a suspenseful question a day, each of increasing difficulty that had to be answered to win the league points towards printing privileges. I purposely designed the questions to have multiple clauses and phrases, and I never repeated the question if they missed something. That meant the students had to rely on each other and confer with each other to learn the part of the question that they may have missed. Of course, the main reason I did all of this was to also introduce these readers to books in a different way. Games lure them in; but the information they gain is what gets them to the library to see what all the fuss is about.

In case you should want to give this a shot, here are some of my questions and their answers:

What author is known as the 1st professional writer, is named for a Shakespearean character, was an orphan, married his 13-year-old cousin, and died a mysterious death? (Ans: Edgar Allen Poe)

What author’s mom was a famous woman’s right’s activist who died just two days after the baby’s birth, was once challenged to write the best horror story, married a man whose 1st wife was discovered dead in a lake, finished her most famous book at 19 but published it anonymously, and had 4 children, only 1 of whom survived? (Ans: Mary Shelly)

This author’s career began in England. Inspired by authors such as Edgar Allen Poe & JRR Tolkien, this author went on to win the 1991 World Fantasy Award for Best Short Story and his horror book that won the British Science Fiction Award, the Hugo, is considered by many to be too frightening for children. He has over 1.5 million followers on Twitter and his 2008 young adult paranormal horror novel won the Newbery Medal. What is the name of his children’s comic book that was adapted into an opera by the Scottish National Theater in 2006? (Ans: The Wolves in the Walls)

This author was a book designer and his works specialize in cyberpunk. He is a lover of math and cryptography who also writes under the name Stephen Bury. He is currently a futurist and comes from a family of engineers and scientists. His first breakthrough novel was published in 1992. What was the name of his novel published in 1995? (Ans: The Diamond Age: Or, A Young Girl’s Illustrated Primer)

Winner of the 2008 Red House Children’s Book Award, three books of his outstanding series each won senior Irish Book Awards in 2009, 2010, and 2013. One of the books in the series was voted Irish Book of the decade. In this paranormal thriller fantasy detective mystery series, there are 13 published books, only 4 of which are available in the U.S. Which is the “taken name” of the main female protagonist, a teenage girl, who learns the fine arts of butt-kicking and sorcery while solving crimes alongside her dapper, but dead, companion? (Ans: Valkyrie Cain)

Winner of the Carnegie Medal for the Library Association, this author’s first book in his award-winning trilogy was named one of the Top 10 Books from a panel and the public named the 1st book in the series the all-time “Carnegie of Carnegies” in 2007. Born in Norwich, England, this author also supported the 2014 Let Books Be Books campaign to stop children’s books being labeled for boys or for girls. In 2012, he curated 50 Grimms classic fairy tales for Penguin Classics. Who narrates the audio book for his award-winning trilogy? (Ans: Philip Pullman)

In the end, the kids had fun, learned something new about search engines, and also, hopefully, became curious about some new books and authors they didn’t know about before. Oh, yeah, and they designed some amazing Superhero League badges.

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2016/10/25/the-internet-research-game-3d-printing-no-whammies/feed/57 Steps to Help Students Succeed on Assessmentshttp://tweenteacher.com/2016/10/09/7-steps-to-avoid-assessment-failure/
http://tweenteacher.com/2016/10/09/7-steps-to-avoid-assessment-failure/#commentsSun, 09 Oct 2016 13:04:13 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=6382This year, I was given a class of LTELs (long-term English Language Learners) and recently exited SPED students with the goal of focusing my lesson implementation on engagement and more social-emotional learning. So we’re leading up to our first grade-level assessment. It’s a doozy, a beast in what it asks of our students and their literacy levels. And as a goal-setting activity prior to the test, I asked why many of them have struggled on assessments in the past. My thought was by identifying what plagued them going into the test, perhaps they could combat those demons when taking it.

The answers showed real reflection and a deep understanding of themselves. Nevertheless, it also shows how little the students understand how to counteract the habits that contribute to their own failure. That’s where we, the teachers, come in.

Check out some of their answers. Some of what they mention they just clearly need to get into the habit of doing (“reading directions,” echem!), but others require us to help students learn strategies to fight off the now-habitualized behavior.

Here are just some of their telling responses:

“I get distracted to the littlest things.”

“When I see huge questions that come with reading I give up.”

“When the reading is too much, I would skim through it not really reading it”

“Sometimes I don’t have faith in myself than I should”

“I’m not interested in it. When I’m interested in something or have experience in it, I would want to do it and do better.

“I like to skip to the easy parts and then I never get to finish the hard parts.”

“I sometimes don’t read the directions and finish fast.”

“I start thinking about other things and don’t concentrate.”

“I was never good at writing essays.”

“When there’s too much writing I shut down”

“When people finish I feel like I’m the last one and put whatever I think and write it fast.”

“before I start the test, I always think negative thoughts.”

“I tend to skip directions.”

“I am always tired and misread stuff.”

“I get distracted when I sit next to people that I get along with.”

“If I see a lot of reading I give up.”

“I skip questions that are long and guess.”

“I always think that I will fail.”

“when there is a whole page of reading and no color.”

“misunderstood words”

“take awhile to start my engine/start my writing”

“day dreaming/zone out”

“I shut down when the going gets tuff”

“I sometimes skip big reads”

“I can lose my focus and get distracted.”

“My brain always freezes up and forgets what I learned when I have tests.”

“I see a huge page that I have to read”

“I skip directions”

“I feel tired”

“my mind is somewhere else”

“when stuff is too hard”

“I gave up too easily”

“I didn’t ask for help”

“When I would run out of thoughts, I always type or write something different to fill in the space.”

“Don’t know what some of the words mean.”

“I have a habit of shutting down on hard things fail challenges while being impacient.”

“I skip the reading and guess.”

“When I do the test, I shut down – like I can’t think”

“I get scared and not know what to do.”

“Sometimes that requires a lot of reading that ends up shutting me down.”

“I sometimes read the questions incorrectly.”

“I have negative thoughts like I feel like I can’t do good…”

“Things that shut me down are usually when there are a lot of text in a test question.”

7 Steps to Help Students Succeed on Assessments

So I categorized these answers to create a short list of seven categories that help with my own strategizing. But they come with the full knowledge that the student must also work to change their habits if failure is to be avoided.

HELP LIMIT DISTRACTIONS – As we move deeper and deeper into a 1:1 world, this takes thinking about. For instance, I’m learning to make YouTube playlists rather than simply send out a link to a video. I’m using more tools that help block ads. All of these lead to over-stimulation online.

HELP THEM DEVELOP A MORE POSITIVE VOICE – When we are already convinced we’ll fail, we will. Help students learn that intelligence is flexible. Give them honest praise as they informally show you successes. Success doesn’t need to be measured by assessments alone.

HELP MAKE THE MATERIAL MORE ENGAGING – We need to put more effort into making our lessons more engaging and meaningful. That doesn’t mean fun; it means making our lessons something they want to learn.

HELP THEM TAKE OWNERSHIP OF WHAT THEY HAVE TO DO THEMSELVES – Give them the list of what they are responsible to do. This “I don’t read the directions” thing is a chronic problem, but we can’t do it for them. They also need to be their own advocate, to ask questions, and insist on clarification. They must learn to raise their hand. They also need to get to sleep at a reasonable time! Hint: some students aren’t mature enough to do this themselves; you have to enlist parent support.

TEACH THEM ACADEMIC VOCABULARY – Teach them the language of the tests. It’s a specific genre and requires targeted lessons and reinforcement. Use these words in class regularly and praise students for using them as well.

SCORE BASED ON CONTENT KNOWLEDGE – Find ways to assess students in different ways. A student who struggles with writing can justify their mathematical equation orally or via Screencastify. A student who shuts down in front of the class might need to pre-record their response or produce a mini-project or written response instead. Unless they are being assessed on writing itself, find other ways to assess how they communicate your content.

TO GET MORE QUALITY, LIMIT THE QUANTITY OF TEXT ON AN ASSESSMENT – On our assessments, really determine what’s necessary and what’s redundant. Analyze if every excerpt and every question is really necessary to assess for content knowledge. We aren’t in the business of punishing a struggling student by giving them an excruciating assessment. It makes them hate reading and makes it harder for you to assess what they really know.

Iend this with a note to self and a call to action: let’s start, as a profession, to think about ways we might be able to become a more positive voice in their heads. We need to be the hopeful and persistent whisper that balances out their internal negative scream.

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2016/10/09/7-steps-to-avoid-assessment-failure/feed/10Gotta Catch ‘Em All: Using Pokemon Go in my 3D Printing/ELA Classhttp://tweenteacher.com/2016/08/21/gotta-catch-em-all-using-pokemon-go-in-my-3d-printingela-class/
http://tweenteacher.com/2016/08/21/gotta-catch-em-all-using-pokemon-go-in-my-3d-printingela-class/#commentsSun, 21 Aug 2016 22:08:18 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=6051I’ve written before about the power of using pop culture in the classroom, and this fall will be no different in Room 1. Admittedly, I can’t say I’m a huge Pokemon fan. It’s one of the cartoons I limit in my own house simply from a “this-is-just-too-cruddy-to-have-share-my-airspace” point of view. My oldest son plays the card game, and my youngest speaks the language of the little critters, but I wouldn’t say we’re obsessed over here.

But along comes Pokemon Go and the whole planet goes berserk. And even I have to admit it’s the greatest game since Space Invaders. Frankly, if I didn’t tap into this kind of global enthusiasm, I would be avoiding something that could prove amazingly engaging for my students.

So for this school year, I planned an initial, start-of-the-year collaborative activity that would hopefully “Catch ’em All,” students as well as Pokemon.

POKEMON GO ELA HUNT

The students in my Make Writing class (a class for long-term EL students that leverages 3D printing to learn reading and writing) will be hunting for 3D printed Pokemon in small groups.

Frontloading:

Earlier that week, I had printed out various Pokemon in different colors – low-poly versions of recognizable characters: yellow = Pikachu, red = Charmander, etc…

I wrote out step-by-step directions for where each Pokemon could be found. Some of the directions were straightforward (take a left, etc…) while some asked students to infer from clues. Reading directions, sequenced informational writing, can be difficult for these students, and I’m hoping that this will be an easy introduction to the concept.

I hid Pokemon in different offices and classrooms and prepped folks to know to expect the students on that day.

Day Of Our Pokemon Go Activity:

1- I made small groups of 4 students each.

2- The groups had to divide up 4 small writing tasks amongst themselves. The full assignment can be found here. Each student was responsible for only one task. At each “Pokestop” one of the students in the group shared their assignment in order for the whole group to advance to the next stop. Here were the 4 tasks they had to divide up amongst the students in the group:

The totodile hid in the counselor’s tree.

Student #1: Found a funny quote from a Pinterest board I shared. They had to memorize it and recite it to the “trainer” at the first stop.

Student #2: Researched when the USA Rugby team was playing and wrote a haiku about rugby. They read this to the “trainer” at stop #2.

Student #3: Explored our new school website and came up with a list of 3 positives that they shared with the next “trainer” at the third stop.

Student #4: Wrote a congratulations card to a teacher who got married this summer and put it on her desk to greet her when school began.

3- The small groups were given the step-by-step directions to each Pokemon location and raced each other as groups to “catch ‘em all.”

4- To prove they had indeed caught all of the Pokemon, the groups had to take selfies with the 3D printed critters and have the adult sign off on the directions sheet.

Our principal, Matt Arnold, was the Pokemon Trainer for the Pikachu print.

5- The first group back got to pick from a stack of 3D printed Pokemon.

Next Steps:

The next step is for students to research different Pokemon files on Thingiverse or MyMiniFactory, figure out the printers and print them out themselves, hide their Pokemon, and write their own step-be-step directions to lead a classmate to find their character.

In addition, my principal (Pokemon trainer #2 who was a Rugby fan) wants this class to run a monthly Pokemon hunt for the entire school. When I told my students about this, they flipped out with excitement and are already discussing rules and workflow to have the game up and running within the month.

I know there are teachers out there using Pokemon Go in their classrooms. What’cha doing to Catch em’ All, students included?

Note: The book I’m currently working on (due out Aug, 2017 for Corwin Publications) is focused on student engagement. This lesson hits some of the key needs for student engagement, according to the students themselves:

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2016/08/21/gotta-catch-em-all-using-pokemon-go-in-my-3d-printingela-class/feed/3Lessons to Share: 3D Printing and Design to Learn Reading & Writinghttp://tweenteacher.com/2016/06/17/lessons-to-share-3d-printing-and-design-to-learn-reading-writing/
http://tweenteacher.com/2016/06/17/lessons-to-share-3d-printing-and-design-to-learn-reading-writing/#commentsFri, 17 Jun 2016 18:15:33 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=5548So I just finished my first week with my Make Writing class. This class, as I’ve written about in the past, is intended to help those long-term EL students who have become disengaged with school and with learning. These kids are always stuck in the drill-and-kill courses, and we thought that one way to address their needs might be to focus on engagement and advocacy as a means to jack up the rigor generally asked of these students. So we’ve given them access to the 3d Printers and to Project Based Learning. In addition, these students all agreed to begin their Language Arts class early so we’ve selected a number of summer days to get us going prior to the official start of the new school year.

Many people have been asking how Making (a seemingly STEM-oriented activity) can relate to literacy and writing. I’ve shared a lesson before that’s proven interesting to people, so I thought I’d also share a few of the lessons we’ve been doing this week to communicate a little about what a two-hour block looks like in the Make Writing summer classroom. The goal is to make learning how to read and write more concrete, more meaningful, and more hands-on.

TUESDAY, JUNE 14

The class met on Tuesday, and many of the students arrived early to grab a Chromebook and a bean bag chair. Here’s what we accomplished and some links to the lessons themselves:

We created the shell of our digital portfolios. That is, we didn’t fill them in, but just created the pages and the students sent me the links so I could create a page of student URLs to refer to throughout the year. We used Google Sites, and created the following pages: About Me, Works in Progress, Final Drafts, Culminating Projects, Reading Log, Writing Journal, Research Library.

We learned how to calibrate the build-plate for the Ultimaker printers & learned how to change the material.

We wrote our first writing journal entry and linked it to the Writing Journal page in our portfolio. This will serve as an informal benchmark of sorts since it’s their first writing piece for me. See assignment below.

We took a “hands-on” break and watched a how-to video in order to learn to assemble fingers for the prosthetic fingers. The parts were printed out and in front of them when they entered the classroom. In the end, we assembled a total of 30 fingers. The kids ended up having to use needlenose pliers in some cases, and that introduced them to where the tools are in the classroom.

We began reading the young readers edition of I Am Malala. Since we will be focusing on advocacy, this was a good choice. It also aligns with the One City, One Book, One Read selection that our high school will be reading as well. My honors classes are also reading it, but I think these students will get a lot out of the content as well, and since I’ll be touching on child-advocacy models throughout the year, this is great place to start. On Tuesday, we got through the prologue.

Writing Journal #1 Assignment: The first journal entry asked them to listen to the opening song from Hamilton, reading the lyrics as they listened. Then, we read the liner notes from Lin-Manuel Miranda, found on Genius.com, and the students independently watched his performance for the president at an open poetry night at The White House. Then, the students answered the prompt: How do you connect to this song or to Hamilton himself? How is your story connected to that of this founding father?

THURSDAY, JUNE 16th

We met again on Thursday and tried to accomplish the following. It seemed to move slower today as I mistimed how long it would take them to sift through some of the resources. I am listing my plan here, but the reality was that we never got to I Am Malala. We’ll make that up next Tuesday and focus on that more next week instead. Here’s what the initial plan was:

We assigned students in small groups to different printers. Maintaining that printer is now their responsibility. Changing the colored filament, taking orders from other classes, troubleshooting, and researching solutions to failed prints is now assigned to specific groups per printer.

We learned the names of our printers and researched their references. Names help students “own” the devices, and each group had to research where their printer’s name had come from. Each printer was named by a student from this year, and this new class now has to learn about its source. Here are the names: Gutenberg, Prints Hamlet, Printsess Impresora, Ada Lovelace, Mr. Chuck Hulls (pronounced “Chuckles.”

We produced Journal Entry #2 and entered it the Writing Journal page on our digital portfolios. See assignment below. Meanwhile, as they were listening and writing, I opened the links to their portfolios and their 1st Writing Journal entries and made sure all links were operational and shared correctly. I made comments on their 1st Writing Journals as they produced their 2nd.

I introduced them to Thingiverse in a structured scavenger hunt assignment that also incorporated the history standards. First they had to define “Open Source.” Then, they had to find a quote from the history standards in grades 6, 7, & 8 and find an image from Thingiverse that could symbolize each of those history standards. For instance, a student could enter the following:

6th Grade

“Around 1500 BCE, Egypt entered the era known as the New Kingdom. Kings such as Thutmose III expanded the Egyptian empire far up the Nile River into what is now Sudan, and into the Levant, that is, the coastal region at the eastern end of the Mediterranean. Teachers highlight Queen Hatshepsut (ca. 1479-1458 BCE) and King Ramses II, also known as Ramses the Great (1279-1212 BCE).”

http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:103876

5. We entered the MLA citation for Thingiverse and the CA History standards document into our “Research Library” page of our digital portfolio.

6. We had planned to read the first chapter of I Am Malala and fill out a summary reading log that would then get linked to the “Reading Log” page of their digital portfolios.

Writing Journal #2: We watched the OK Go! Rube Goldberg Machine.What was the main objective of the machine? I then asked students to count the steps it took to achieve that goal. (That took forever!) The prompt was: How can you pop a balloon in 10-15 steps? Hint: start with the last one and work your way backwards.

Next week we’ll be focusing on I Am Malala and summarizing our reading. I’ll post some more lessons and reflections as I go!

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2016/06/17/lessons-to-share-3d-printing-and-design-to-learn-reading-writing/feed/6The Argh Wall! Celebrating Failure in the Classroom: A Lesson For Writing & Makinghttp://tweenteacher.com/2016/05/15/the-argh-wall-celebrating-failure-in-the-classroom-a-lesson-for-writing-making/
http://tweenteacher.com/2016/05/15/the-argh-wall-celebrating-failure-in-the-classroom-a-lesson-for-writing-making/#commentsSun, 15 May 2016 15:57:48 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=5324So, I’ve been writing lately about my new class that I’m developing for next year called Make Writing. I’ve been writing curriculum for this class that leverages 3D printing in order to teach Literacy and Writing. The class itself is made up of many of our students who have, up until now, been detached from more traditional education. They are the ones at risk for dropping out. They are the ones being left behind by life. My school, however, wants to attack their disengagement in a different way, and that’s where this class comes in. We’re hoping that the Making aspect of this class helps to make learning more meaningful, more hands-on, and overall, more engaging. After all, student engagement is the key. As Kelly Gallagher says, Engagement first, then Content, then Rigor.

I’ve also written about the challenges of learning 3D printing myself. You see, I’m leveraging my own ignorance as a model of how to learn, and the kids are finding that I learn this tech far slower than they do. But while the hardware is out of my wheelhouse, Language Arts is not. So I’ve begun developing the lessons that will become our benchmark writing assignments, ongoing journal prompts, as well as informal and formal assessments for the next school year.

The Argh Wall! is one of the first writing lessons I conceived for the class. It embraces the failures that come with 3D printing as well as the failures that sometimes come with the writing process. After all, if you think of writing as tinkering, then failure is just another way of saying “feedback prior to revision.”

Here is the lesson, the standards it hits based on 8th-grade Literacy and Writing, and a student sample to help you model for your students. I picture it as an ongoing assignment that students contribute to as failures happen. It’s a wall of student work that rotates depending on the projects that are under way and the progress that’s being made on any given piece of work. It’s a way for them to reflect, plan a next strategy of attack, and be assessed on constructed response writing. You can also access the file to make your own copy at www.tinyurl.com/ArghWall.

A picture of the current Argh! Wall

The ARGH! Wall

Created by Heather Wolpert-Gawron (aka “Tweenteacher”) This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution, Non-commercial 4.0 International License

Overview: In this writing assignment, students will adopt a growth mindset by celebrating their failures through reflection and challenging themselves to come up with next steps.

As students work using 3D printing, it is not uncommon to fail. With each failure, however, students should be encouraged to look at the steps it took to create the print, note what worked, and propose tweaks to the process before getting back up again.

Students will create a constructed response outline that shares information about their specific print, talks about their goal, and honestly shares what went wrong. For the purpose of this assignment, students are permitted to use appropriate voice to vent their frustration. They are also encouraged to use the vocabulary specific to 3D modeling and printing (extruder, nozzle, retraction, build-plate, bed, etc…)

Constructed Response Outline:

Main Topic Sentence – What went wrong?

Expand on Main Topic Sentence – What is the overview of the project

Evidence of failure – What specifically happened that led to the failure of the print? What problems could you observe in the outcome of the print? (hairy printing, stringing, didn’t stick to the bed, etc…) You can include a photo, descriptions of your observations, specific descriptions of what you attempted (numbers from the tablet) as evidence.

Commentary – Prediction, Relate to the problem, Connect this to something else

Conclusion – How can you move on?

Finally, the student should end on 1-3 bullets to propose next steps.

My Example:

This Pyramid of Giza was a failed print, but a successful lesson learned. Not only did the painter’s tape warp immediately, but it was obvious from the start that this was going to affect the entire build. As you can see from the picture, the letters got squished and the layers didn’t flatten properly. I didn’t waste time shutting it down so that it didn’t waste filament or time. It was yet another failed print using blue ABS filament, and I wonder if that dye has something to do with the layers not “stacking” right. My next steps to solve this problem (I hope):

Cry. Just kidding.

Find out how to lower the temperature of a heated bed so maybe the tape stays flat

Try the same print in a different color

Standards: (Note: standards here reflect the Grade 8 standard for Literacy and Writing but can be reflected for all middle and high school level artifacts)

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.8.1 – Cite the textual evidence that most strongly supports an analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.8.2 – Write informative/explanatory texts to examine a topic and convey ideas, concepts, and information through the selection, organization, and analysis of relevant content.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.8.2.A -Introduce a topic clearly, previewing what is to follow; organize ideas, concepts, and information into broader categories; include formatting (e.g., headings), graphics (e.g., charts, tables), and multimedia when useful to aiding comprehension.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.8.2.F – Provide a concluding statement or section that follows from and supports the information or explanation presented.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.8.10 – Write routinely over extended time frames (time for research, reflection, and revision) and shorter time frames (a single sitting or a day or two) for a range of discipline-specific tasks, purposes, and audiences.

Student Sample:

Ashley T.

Language Arts

Period 7

3/30/16

ARGH! Paragraph

You know, I’d expect these magical “voodoo” like printers to do an extraordinary job with making my invention, but when I first saw the print out, I didn’t see my invention in all its glory–instead, I got a flippin’ hairy box looking back at me. Unnecessary filament strings hanging everywhere. Come on, this ugly thing isn’t even mine! This print was supposed to be a 3D prototype for my invention (for the Invention Convention), but I can’t even use this. As a matter of fact, my invention is supposedly going to be manufactured with a 3D printer, but after seeing this, I’m very discouraged to do so. After doing some research, thank you very much, I found out that this was a problem that many printers have, known as “stringiness”. It seems to be caused by nozzles that move too slow and temperatures that are too hot. After seeing this, we attempted to change the nozzle temperature to 210 degrees and the build plate temperature to 70 degrees, but the results varied with different types of filament. For example, the red filament seemed to produce perfect results, but the blue and silver (especially silver) had not-so-great prints. Does this mean that the filament itself contributes to stringiness? Perhaps different colors call for different settings? Next, we decided to reprint my invention once more (with the red filament). The results did not meet to my expectation, but it was better than before. Still, there are strings…ARGH!!!! I suppose I could continue to tinker around with the printer’s settings to get a perfect print or I could simply use something else to make my 3D prototype.

The next attempts to solving this problem, as recommended by 3D Verkstan’s website, would be:

Turn the nozzle temperature down to 180 degrees.

Change (increase) travel speed to 250mm/m.

Change the filament–after changing the nozzle temperature to 210 degrees and the build plate temperature to 70 degrees, I think the problem might be in the filament.

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2016/05/15/the-argh-wall-celebrating-failure-in-the-classroom-a-lesson-for-writing-making/feed/10Past, Present, Future: Assessments and Technologyhttp://tweenteacher.com/2016/04/02/past-present-future-assessments-and-technology/
http://tweenteacher.com/2016/04/02/past-present-future-assessments-and-technology/#commentsSat, 02 Apr 2016 21:54:18 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=5058“Grading, in kids’ brains, parents’ brains, administrators’ brains, and even teachers’ brains, is a final snapshot after which there is no beyond. But if we can start thinking about assessments as a means to drive feedback, NOW you’re on to something.”

Recently I recorded a segment for a friend of mine who teaches a blended graduate-level class called, “Technology Facilitated Assessment.” I had a blast answering questions reflecting on how I assessed students in 2006, how I assess them now, and where I predict assessments will be in the future.

The whole segment for the students is a little over 18 min in length, but if you’re looking for skim through it for some tidbits, here’s an informal breakdown of the piece.

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2016/04/02/past-present-future-assessments-and-technology/feed/1Alternative Strategies for Assessing Learning: Larry Ferlazzo Classroom Q & A Podcasthttp://tweenteacher.com/2016/03/30/alternative-strategies-for-assessing-learning-larry-ferlazzo-classroom-q-a-podcast/
http://tweenteacher.com/2016/03/30/alternative-strategies-for-assessing-learning-larry-ferlazzo-classroom-q-a-podcast/#commentsThu, 31 Mar 2016 03:37:20 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=5024“Whether they’re doing a portfolio or a performance task, they still want to see How do I stack up?”

I had a lot of fun being interviewed for Larry Ferlazzo’s podcast about alternatives to grading and traditional assessments. The follow-up written contribution will appear in his upcoming Educational Week column.

Some takeaways:

Grading can’t go away until all stakeholders want it; but do they want it?

Sharing new ways to assess students in a way that all stakeholders can appreciate

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2016/03/30/alternative-strategies-for-assessing-learning-larry-ferlazzo-classroom-q-a-podcast/feed/5Kids Speak Out on Student Engagementhttp://tweenteacher.com/2016/03/10/kids-speak-out-on-student-engagement/
http://tweenteacher.com/2016/03/10/kids-speak-out-on-student-engagement/#respondThu, 10 Mar 2016 13:29:10 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=4824Hey, middle school and high school teachers and parents! Can you do me a favor?

I am polling thousands of kids nationwide on what engages them the most in how they learn. This is based on a survey of 500 students I administered in 2012. It became a post for The George Lucas Educational Foundation’s Edutopia.org, that’s almost hit the 50K share mark, and now I’m looking to widen my pool of recipients.

Would you mind sending this link out to your students and encouraging them to participate? It should take them 5-10 minutes to complete the survey. I read every submission, and will be sharing the results in the near future so that we all might learn from the voices of our students.

This was the email I received two weeks ago from my principal who is working with me to develop a whole new kind of Language Arts class. The plan is to leverage 3D printing into a reading and writing class, hopefully making abstract concepts more concrete for some of our more disengaged students.

Many middle and high-schools are struggling to address the needs of their long-term English Language Learners. These students have lived in the United States for at least 6 years, some their whole lives, but continue to be challenged by basic literacy, oral communication, and writing skills. They often go unnoticed, and many times are written off as failures. They get shoved in drill-and-kill classes of the dullest curriculum, never gaining access to the more rigorous or more engaging lessons that many times seem to be a privilege of only the academically accomplished.

So how do we get these students, many of whom drop out of school at an alarming rate, engaged again in learning? How do we get them to WANT to put in the sweat equity it would take to get those academic neurons firing again?

I think we have a shot at it if we look at how to teach them in a very different way. What we’ve been doing in the past doesn’t work, so I’m looking towards technology for help. I think 3D Printing might be our key. It’s not the only component, but I’m thinking it might be the hook and the glue.

So an idea began to percolate, and it wouldn’t go away. It kept me up at night. And in the end, I’ve developed this new kind of ELA class called Make Writing, a title inspired by a book of the same name in the Hack Learning series, a book that presents writing as a tinkering process.

Of course, this kind of technology is not in my wheelhouse. I’ve been a reading and writing teacher for 15 years now. I’m a fellow of the National Writing Project, and I’ve taught reading and writing from 3rd grade to 12th grade. But as my passion for cross-curricular lesson design began to grow, so too did my interest in STEM. I wrote a book about writing across the content areas and started focusing more of my class time on Project Based Learning as a vehicle for my reading and writing curriculum.

With my interest in STEM, I realized that our segregated silos of learning did a disservice to our learners. Those who liked reading and writing could succeed in ELA class because it was literature that was, for the most part, what teachers were asking students to write about. But what if, I began asking myself, we used other triggers for writing? What if we used this new technology to inspire making both items and words?

And so begins my journey to merge the teaching of reading and writing with 3D Printing.

THE CLASS DEVELOPMENT BEGINS

So, here’s where we are with the development of this class:

1.I did my research in printers and how to print. For me, this is both amazingly fun and amazingly agonizing. I love learning something new, but I have zippo interest in hardware. Nevertheless, I keep reminding myself, I am teaching kids who probably have zippo interest in Shakespeare, so it’s only fair that I go through the process of being a student myself.

We received five Ultimaker 2s and five 3D printing pens.

2. I’m redesigning my space…again. The printers arrived! Yesterday, a whole palette of boxes arrived that somehow I needed to make room for immediately. So I began a purge of books from my classroom library, those dusty ones that haven’t seen action in over 5 years. I’m also busting open moving boxes that have been full of out-of-date student exemplars from lessons I no longer even conduct.

2. My principal and our counselors have gotten a list together of the students who meet the criteria of long-term English Language Learner. These students and their parents or guardians will get a letter in their home language asking them to attend a meeting. There, the Make Writing class will be described to them in full so they can voluntarily opt-in to participating. Ideally, we are asking that the kids be able to meet periodically over the summer. This is for two reasons:

I pitched the fact that I always work with my Honors students over the summer and that this gives them an advantage. Because we know who will be filling the honors classes before we leave for break, teachers can reach out and begin building relationships via email or send out summer assignments if they want. Mainstream students, however, are placed in classes later in the summer, and thus, don’t have access to teachers until the fall. In a sense, the honors kids get more time to learn expectations and work 1:1 with a teacher when it’s the remedial students that really could use that time.

I don’t want the class to be about learning the technology. I want that to take place over the summer. I want us to start building our learning community and tackle the basics of the printers before fall. Inevitably, we’ll have to pause some of what we’re doing to crack open the grade-level standardized stories or assessments. I want us to build a momentum of the newness before we have to “interrupt our broadcast” for more traditional assessments.

A failed Pyramid of Giza. The first of many failed prints.

3. I’m learning. I’m learning the tech in baby steps, and believe me, it’s a lesson in learning from failures. But I’m keeping a log of lessons from each print, both successful and failed, in an attempt to model for students that the only mistakes are those you don’t learn from. Try, try again. It’s OK to take risks. Well, you get the idea.

4. I’m beginning to develop the reading and writing lessons themselves. I have my first week-long unit developed that incorporates small-group work, sequential writing, and Rube Goldberg Machines. I’m creating a bulletin board I’m calling the Argh! Wall that will consist of reflections in the format of constructed response paragraphs based on failed prints and ending in next steps. I’ve written a couple of my own already as models. Here’s one:

This Pyramid of Giza was a failed print, but a successful lesson learned. Not only did the painter’s tape warp immediately, but it was obvious from the start that this was going to affect the entire build. As you can see from the picture, the letters got squished and the layers didn’t flatten properly. I didn’t waste time shutting it down so that it didn’t waste filament or time. It was yet another failed print using blue filament, and I wonder if that dye has something to do with the layers not “stacking” right. My next steps to solve this problem (I hope):

Cry. Just kidding.

Find out how to lower the temperature of a heated bed so maybe the tape stays flat

Try the same print in a different color

5. I’ve hooked up with the folks at e-NABLE for bigger-themed objectives. They have been so embracing and helpful with learning the technology. I’m planning on advocacy as a real linchpin for this class because I want the middle schoolers to work towards something greater than themselves. I’ve joined their E3Steam network and their Google + community to learn and share as I go.

Well, that’s where we are. My principal and I can’t high-five each other yet. Who knows if we’ll succeed. But we’re also willing to redefine success with these students. If engagement and accessibility to more rigorous curriculum are our goals, we’re hoping that the learning will come.

]]>http://tweenteacher.com/2016/02/07/pencils-to-3d-printers-a-new-kind-of-language-arts-class/feed/10Eeny, Meeny, Mino, Moe: Which 3D Printer Should We Own?http://tweenteacher.com/2016/01/27/eeny-meeny-mino-moe-which-3d-printer-should-we-own/
http://tweenteacher.com/2016/01/27/eeny-meeny-mino-moe-which-3d-printer-should-we-own/#commentsThu, 28 Jan 2016 01:58:25 +0000http://tweenteacher.com/?p=4440A couple weeks ago, I wrote about the start of my journey to create a Language Arts and ELD class that leveraged 3D printing as a means to initiate a more purposeful curriculum for reading and writing. I will be posting more about my rationale in my February post for Edutopia. I will also be sharing some of my lessons, my (hopeful) successes, and my (sure to be many) failures as well. Check back for future posts to live vicariously through the drama.

I should say here that none of this happens without the support of my principal and my district. This is a collaborative process trying to think “outside the box” to reach students that need something other than what we’ve given them before. It’s a jump into the unknown for us all, but we’re willing to hold our breath and leap.

This post will take you through a detailed continuation of my hunt for the perfect 3D printer.

WELCOME TO THE SHOWROOM

My last post included a list of printers I had learned about through the folks on the e-NABLE discussion boards. I’m planning to use e-NABLE hands as a keystone project for the class. They partner people with 3D printers: classrooms, vendors, and hobbyists, with children in need of prosthetics.

I’m hoping that by weaving e-NABLE into the curriculum, I don’t just lure my students into more authentic informational reading and writing, but also nurture a vital character trait that can be allusive to many middle schoolers: compassion. Middle School is, developmentally, a very me-centric chapter in one’s life, and I’m hoping that this relationship with e-NABLE and the potential to 3D print solutions to other problems as well, is something that will excite students to thinking beyond themselves.

But I digress. The folks on the discussion boards, amazingly generous and knowledgeable folks, led me to one of the printers, the Lulzbot. I called the Lulzbot folks. They gave me the name of a local (somewhat) reseller, Matterhackers, in Lake Forest, CA. I called Matterhackers, and within one week, my principal and I had an appointment to go to their showroom for a tour. Matterhackers, for us, is about a two-hour drive. Nevertheless, my principal and I went on a field trip.

When we got there, it was a little like the tent that Mr. Weasley sets up for the Quidditch World Cup. When we walked in, it appeared to be a small room with a few printers on the tables and prints on the walls. But when we were escorted through another door, a whole other world opened up.

We were guided through shelves and shelves of ceiling-high stacks of multi-colored filament that they ship all over the world. We were introduced to developers, designers, salespeople, and marketing agents. All of them were happy to contribute pieces of information that added to our growing knowledge about this world.

We ended up meeting in the work room where the employees tinker and print their designs. A Lulzbot was busy building a gear behind us, creating a sort of industrial music as we spoke. There were machines of all sizes, kits you could build, and super sexy Apple-esque ones that looked more sci-fi than industrial age.

They had even done research on e-NABLE hands so that if we didn’t think to ask a question, they could still anticipate what we needed to know. That’s key. It’s important to find folks that aren’t just waiting for you to ask the right questions.

In the end, we walked away with quotes on two bundles of printers and various other accoutrements. I’m going to break this down for you because I know there are teachers out there who are just as new to this as I am.

THE 3D PRINTER BUNDLES AND WHAT THEY MEAN

The two printers we settled on are the Ultimaker 2 and the Lulzbot Mini. Both are user-friendly and reported to be particularly plug-and-print, vital in working with kids. As a teacher new to this, I wasn’t looking for one that required a great deal of tinkering to see initial results. Some things we had quoted with both printers:

Five 3D printing pens – They worked out a discounted price for us.

A MatterControl tablet – These are not necessary, but we didn’t want the printers to require a tether to a particular laptop. There’s free software as well, but then the printers would have to be USB-attached to their own computer. We want students to use Tinkercad on their Chromebooks, send their files to the tablet, and form a queue of projects that won’t fall asleep in the middle of the printing process.

Some filament – discounted with an additional discount on all future filament orders

The sexy Ultimaker 2

The Ultimaker 2

The Ultimaker 2 is apparently about to be discontinued as they bring in the Pro. The differences in the products addressed some tweaks folks were asking for, but for this reason, Matterhackers was able to give us a discount on the remaining inventory. Check your local resellers to see if they are doing the same kind of deal.

The Ultimaker is housed with a box around 3 sides to make it both sexier and safer.

We’re told the extruder (the thing the stuff comes out of) produces a nice product, but can be a little trickier than other models. Nevertheless, it seems do-able.

The bed is large (to support bigger pieces) and heated. That’s important because we want the filament (stuff) to stick as it prints.

This baby’s the top-o-the-line, and reviews predict it to have decent longevity. After all, we might have money now, but in two years we might not.

In terms of nozzles, the Ultimaker only needs the one it comes with for hard and soft filaments necessary for e-NABLE hand creations. Some printers need you to do a nozzle switch-out to make that possible.

Lulzbot Mini

Lulzbot Mini

The Lulzbot looks more industrial. My principal loved how you could see the gears working and liked the exposed wires. (shrug)

We saw it in action, and while it was loud, it really did create a cool “making” sound that was somewhat satisfying to hear.

In order to create an e-NABLE hand, the Lulzbot needs a different nozzle extruder attachment. That brought the price up to almost the same amount as the Ultimaker 2. (The Ultimaker Pro is still a few hundred more.) However, the Lulzbot Mini got higher points with Matterhacks for its ease in how the filament comes out.

I should note here that there is a bigger version of the Lulzbot (the Taz) that is also ranked high. Pricewise it ranks between the Ultimaker 2 and the Lulzbot Mini. However, the guys at Matterkachers did their research and pitched us the lower price model after confirming that it could work with the e-NABLE hands as well.

SO WHAT’S THE VERDICT?

In the end, we’re going to approach the district with both quotes but pushing more towards the Ultimaker 2. We’re hoping to get some MacBooks as well for multimedia chronicling and to create How-to iBooks.

I’ll continue sharing my findings and decisions as I learn more. Schools and our students can make a difference in our local communities and beyond. I can’t wait to share this journey with you!

“The ostrich isn’t very good at smelling, while the zebra can smell pretty well. The zebra though, doesn’t have good eyesight, but the ostrich does. So, the zebra can smell danger while the ostrich can see it. Together, they can help one another flee from predators.”

Pair with: Freak the Mighty

Why: The two main characters in the book form a symbiotic relationship, each utilizing the other’s strengths to protect themselves from the social and academic world around them. Doesn’t every middle schooler want a friendship like that?

“Body image doesn’t just happen. It’s a complex phenomenon influenced by many factors, including parents, peers, and social contexts. But we know that media messages play a powerful role in shaping gender norms and body satisfaction.”

Pair with: Uglies

Why: Uglies focuses on a future world where a surgical procedure to attain the perfect face and body are a rite of passage for every tween. But what happens if a young person decides that future has its drawbacks? Uglies explores our perception of perfect and what a society of image-obsessed citizens might give up in their attainment of beauty.

“For years, archaeologists have wondered where her tomb might be hidden. Nefertiti belonged to the family line of the famous King Tutankhamun, better known as King Tut. Indeed, some believe she was Tut’s mother. While the other royals in her line are all accounted for, Nefertiti is still missing.”

Pair with: The Red Pyramid

Why: The Red Pyramid is a fictional mystery set to the beat of Egyptian mythology. This article, however, chronicles a true-life mystery students can witness that is ongoing right now. Egyptian mythology is fascinating to middle school students, but not surprisingly, so is its history.

“The point, Burns says, is that every story has characters—it’s just a matter of letting them breathe and tell their stories. “You have all of the elements of the progress of characters,” he says. ‘You have the drama of ‘who will do it, who will not,’ and all of these things that go into a good story, specifically. It’s not so much that you manipulate the story to focus on that, but as you’re winnowing it down, these rise to the surface like cream.’ “

Pair with: Nothing But the Truth

Why: Nothing But the Truth uses a documentary-style format to tell a story about an incident that happened in a school, told from different points of view. The article discusses the different ways documentaries capture storytelling and how they can use the characters and the conflict to weave together a narrative without the filmmakers interfering too much in manipulating the reality. Students learn through the article as well as through the novel, that documentaries are all around us.

“Research and advocacy organizations such as the The Sentencing Project have pointed to what they characterize as a “cascade of disparities” throughout the criminal justice system, which includes “uneven policing” that makes it much more likely young black males in particular will be confronted, arrested and detained.”

Pair with: Monster

Why: The students of today will recognize in Monster the themes also found in recent events that have fueled the BlackLivesMatter movement. The main character is a 16-year old in juevenile detention and on trial. Those around him question his innocence and we learn, through flashbacks, of his childhood in Harlem.